Review of Let the Right One In (2008) by Paulf — 04 May 2009

Dracula's daughter meets Nietzsche's adolescent angst with a tweeny bit of love thrown in the mix. The film was quite realistic, at least for a 12 year old vampire living in Sweden. Actually all kidding aside Let the Right One In was superbly acted.

The two main child actors were real gems. Let the Right One In was also immensely rich with emotional depth. If this film did have a fault is that it was that it was persistently morose. [***WARNING POTENTIAL SPOILER***] What the director interprets (or tried to project) as a happy ending really was horrifying.

Either that or Swedes are more depressive than I thought. OK it could be interpreted that Oskar was not Eli's butt monkey Renfield in that he did not eat bugs and probably wasn't simply being used by her to fulfill a need as her feeling for him seemed genuine.

But still he did run away from home to help a serial killer, granted vampire by necessity. Yet vampires need love too, right? I guess the crux of the film was about the powerful mutual connection that evolved be-tween these two even in the mist of the most darkest of contexts, pure unadulterated (another pun) violence.

Also that Eli nor Oskar's violent fantasies weren't simply portrayed as evil. There was a certain isness about the film in general that avoided moralistic dualities. In this sense was the strong existential and stoic undercurrents.

In short Let the Right One In is the thinking man's/woman's film. Personally I prefer Buffy & Angel which are also highly philosophical yet gave the viewers a much needed breaks using comedy and social drama.

However for what it was Let the Right One In was right on the money. If Ingrid Bergman made a film about vampire's this would be pretty darn close to the end product he might create. This is a compliment.

But at the same time it's not always easy to stick with a Bergman film. They are the type of films you work at and hopefully come away with something more than just the taste of eye candy. In this case mission accomplished.